Job Hunt (30 page)

“The fuckers really hung you out to dry.”

Jack didn’t answer that. He drained his mug and started to walk Aidan through the events of the previous days, not leaving anything out.

Aidan Conrad stretched out his long legs and—for the most part—sat as still as a meditating cat. Occasionally he wrote a brief note on his pad, but he didn’t interrupt Jack’s narrative.

Jack was aware of the office getting busy as people arrived for work. He registered the curious glances that were thrown their way, but he didn’t get up to close the door to the small meeting room.

“So Gorish is facing assault charges over Frazer’s broken head, and you’re tracing his activities to find solid evidence for fraud,” Aidan summarized when Jack stopped speaking.

“Correct.”

“On top of which you’re trying to find that pimp, six boys he’s keeping locked up in a brothel, and the man or men who stabbed Baxter.”

Jack nodded again. Another mug of coffee seemed appropriate, so he slipped from his seat to get the coffeemaker started again.

“I’ll have one too, thanks.” Aidan watched Jack pouring water and measuring coffee beans. “I’m thinking that the pimp is more of a priority here, especially if you want to get to those boys. So why don’t I sit on Gorish while you focus on locating that sucker? You can’t tell me you don’t have an idea or two.”

“You have scary cat ears.” Jack handed over a fresh mug of coffee.

“Barrister. Comes with the territory.”

“What about Gorish, though? Don’t you want to know who he’s in bed with?”

“Sure, but get your priorities right, kid. Gorish has nowhere to go. That pimp does. At least until you have a name and a mug shot. And if he’s cocky enough to take out a cop, you must be close.”

“Or he’s desperate.”

“Whatever. Point is you need to focus on him. If you’re not sure about Lisa, work with Raf Gallant. He won’t fuck you over.”

A whole chandelier lit up Jack’s mind at those words. “Gareth called you when I needed a safe place for the boys.”

Aidan nodded, and his eyes were careful. “He didn’t tell me shit, you know. He just said he needed a safe house and someone to guard it.”

“And you sent Raf.”

“He’s good.”

“Yes. He’s that.”

“And I trust him.”

There was that word again. Jack still frowned every time he heard it. To him, trust was a sum of two parts: Rio Palmer and Gareth Flynn. And Gareth’s half of that equation was so new it was still shiny.

“That’s why you don’t answer your phone. Either of you.” Gareth breezed into the room trailing scents of rain and hospital disinfectant in his wake. “Before you ask, Frazer is fine. He’s overdone the geekery is all. They actually allowed him home, but nowhere near a computer for the next three days at least.”

“He’ll die of boredom.”

“That’s what he said too. Is there any more coffee in that?”

“Help yourself,” Aidan rumbled. “I’ve suggested that I deal with Gorish while Jack goes after the pimp. Any problems with that?”

“I’m worried we—”

“You said something last night about a money trail?” Gareth cut in, emptying the contents of the coffeemaker’s glass carafe into a mug and immediately refilling the machine to brew another batch. Coffee machines in the corporate security office led a short but fruitful life.

“Yeah. Frazer thought he recognized bank details. It’s possible. Kid has a good visual memory.”

“Bank details are easy to check. Just give me the list, and we’ll flag anything that isn’t part of payroll for a more detailed look.”

Gareth didn’t even sit down. He gulped coffee and shifted on the balls of his feet, ready to jump into action at a moment’s notice. He used to be like that while they served, always buzzing until the orders came down. Then he’d grow calm and as solid as a rock, the steady center of the maelstrom. Seventeen-year-old Jack used to admire that ability. Now he admired the fact that some things never changed.

“Like Aidan said, nailing Gorish for fraud is not as critical as getting the pimp off the street.”

“Fine.” Jack knew he was being managed, but he didn’t care enough to argue. He didn’t waste time explaining that he didn’t want to find the pimp as much as the other boys Nico and Daniel had talked about when they thought nobody was listening. Nico in particular was worried that Goran—and Jack hadn’t missed that slip either, though he kept that piece of information to himself—would take their disappearance out on the other boys. Jack had racked his brain trying to remember if there had been any other boys in the club that night who could have belonged to the pimp. Nothing had come to mind then or since, and those shadowy figures nagged at him.

He could lose himself in work, in tracing communications halfway around the world, but those distractions never worked for long before the image of six trapped boys intruded once more. He was grateful to Aidan and Gareth for giving him the time and opportunity to hunt, wishing he’d not feel guilty about skipping out on a job he’d been hired to do.

“Don’t issue any finance data just yet,” he advised gruffly as he stood and drained his mug. “And keep in mind that we have no evidence that Gorish is behind the technical leak. We’re nowhere near home and dry.”

He didn’t wait to hear the snarky comments that were brewing behind two pairs of lips.

T
HEIR
FIRST
break came from Raf. He called Jack just before lunch, voice full of triumph. “I know who stabbed Baxter, and I know where we can find him. You in?”

“Is the Pope a Catholic?” Jack was already up, freezing screens and reaching for his jacket. “Where?”

“I’m almost to you.”

“’Kay.”

Jack sprinted for the stairs, dialing Gareth’s mobile as he ran. “Raf’s got a lead. Checking it out,” he said hurriedly when the voice mail kicked in. Let it not be said that he didn’t keep his boss informed, not even when said boss was in a meeting with Julian Nancarrow and Aidan Conrad and had his phone turned off. Gallant couldn’t have timed that any better.

“Who and where?” he asked as Gallant pulled his car to a stop, and he slid into the passenger seat. It was a measure of how screwed up his life had become that Jack was spending more time in Range Rovers these days than on his bike. Raf’s Ranger was forest green on the outside, the paint clean and the chrome polished to a high shine. The interior, by comparison, was a total mess. Notebooks and maps vied for space with camera equipment, torn sweet wrappers, and empty Starbucks mugs.

“Stakeout?”

“Yeah, ignore it. I’ll get it taken care of when this is over.”

“Come on, spill,” Jack demanded. “Who stabbed Clive, and how do you know?”

“I recognized a face from the feed in the alley. Guy is small-time muscle for hire. Stabbing a cop is out of his league. I reckon he was threatened, or he got paid extra well.”

Jack woke up his tablet. “Name?”

“Gary Downs. Hangs out at a popular boxing gym in the East End.”

“That’s where we’re headed?”

“Yep. And by the way, Danny and Nico had another very quiet night. No idea what you did, but no more nightmares.”

“For now,” Jack muttered, trying to keep focused on his search. Nightmares had lives of their own, and Jack couldn’t stop them any more than he could erase the memories that triggered them. All he could do was teach Nico, and especially Daniel, ways to handle them.

A bump in the road jolted him out of his thoughts, and the tablet lost Internet access. Wi-Fi reception in the city was patchy and hot-spotting his phone didn’t improve matters by much. Jack kept at it, though, trying to learn as much as he could about the man Raf thought had assaulted Clive Baxter.

“That’s the place,” Raf announced after half an hour. By now Jack was up to speed on Gary Downs’s personal information and the contents of his rap sheet. The thing read like the Magna Carta, but as Raf had pointed out, knife crime or human trafficking hadn’t yet made it into the man’s skill set.

“How do you wanna play this? Does he know you?”

“I’ve arrested him twice, so I should imagine so.” Raf pulled up on the other side of the road from the gym. “They should stop letting them back out, know what I mean?”

“Oh, I hear you.” Jack nodded even as he surveyed the street. Traffic was moderate, heaviest along the small row of shops and toward the bank at the corner. Cars pulled in and out of half a dozen marked parking bays in quick succession as people stopped to grab sandwiches or run a quick errand or two in their lunch breaks. The end of the street where Raf had parked was quieter. The gym had its own parking lot with some very shiny metal in it, and Jack took a moment to memorize number plates.

“Do you want Downs, or do you just want to know who hired him?”

“We need to talk to him about the stabbing, on the face of it, at least,” Raf said, and Jack smirked at the way Raf’s mind worked.

“Let me go chat him up. If he has anything useful to say, I’ll bring him out. Park so you’re ready to back me up?”

Raf nodded and waved for Jack to get going. “I can work with that.”

T
HE
BOXING
gym was larger than the outside suggested. Busier too, with a lunch crowd composed of both hopeful young talent, eager to be seen, and corporate types coming in for their workout.

Jack liked the sanded wooden boards that made the space appear like a giant stage. Individual training areas clustered together like room sets, and a row of padded sparring rings ran along the far wall.

The acrid mix of sweat, air freshener, and heavy-duty disinfectant common to gyms all over the world hung heavy in the air, but the atmosphere held a cheerful buzz, and the high ratio of trainers to trainees suggested a well-run, popular place to work out.

“Checking us out?” A man with some complicated initials embroidered on the breast pocket of his maroon polo shirt stepped up to him as Jack came through the door.

“Just moved jobs.” He nodded, looking around as if curious. “Looking for a place to work out.”

“Boxed before?”

Stray memories made one corner of Jack’s mouth curl up in a smile. He preferred martial arts schools that used weapons, but where Gareth was in charge everyone was taught to box. Jack had the basics down even if gloves weren’t his thing.

“While ago.”

“Well… we run both beginners and refresher sessions every week. Once you’ve decided that you’d like to get into it again, you’re assigned to a coach who will work with you every time you come in….”

The man rattled on, pointing out class schedules and going on about training regimes, nutrition plans, and equipment. Jack followed him around, attentive look on his face and nodding in all the appropriate places, while a separate part of his mind catalogued every face and assessed the fight capabilities of each man he saw. He’d spotted Gary Downs from the doorway and kept half an eye on the man while he followed in his guide’s wake.

At the far side of the gym, Jack’s guide retrieved a stack of papers for Jack to complete and return on his next visit. They were the usual stuff—personal information, health questionnaire, and banking details—and Jack nodded his thanks and stowed the forms.

He’d been watching Downs get ready for a sparring match, but when he turned away from the small desk where the forms had been, Gary Downs was no longer in his line of sight. Instead of the man suspected of stabbing a detective, Jack locked eyes with a pale-skinned, pale-eyed man with stringy blond hair and a face he had reason to remember.

The pimp didn’t wear leather today, but the T-shirt, jeans, and jacket combo he’d chosen didn’t make him look any more approachable. Or enticing.

Jack felt he owed someone a candle. He had just been handed the pimp, along with a roomful of men who knew him. Men who could be made to answer questions. No, he couldn’t arrest the man, couldn’t even make a move toward him, but none of that mattered now that he had a place and people that were tied to the pimp.

Jack’s gaze didn’t linger. He shifted his stance a fraction to keep the tattoo on his temple out of the man’s direct line of sight before he scanned the room for the pimp’s hired muscle and—with his heart in his throat—any of the man’s boys. It was a long shot, and Jack didn’t expect to get that lucky twice in quick succession, but he took the time to take a good look around regardless. At least the bodyguards were easy to spot, one close to the pimp, the other close to the entrance.

He followed his guide as he continued the tour of the gym, moving by rote, nodding, and answering questions he barely heard. The man led him toward the back of the room to inspect the sparring rings, and Jack suddenly found himself wedged into a small crowd cheering a fight, his view of the exit barred by hard, muscled bodies.

It was pretty obvious that the pimp or his bodyguards had triggered the crowd’s reaction, though there was no hint of violence in the air. Had the pimp really recognized Jack as the man who had abducted Ricky, his reception would have been much less benign than this rather casual attempt to distract him from something he might have seen.

As far as the pimp was concerned, Jack had laid eyes on the wrong man, was all. And he had to get out and back to Raf before the man managed to disappear again.

Trapped in the small crowd, with only a lackluster fight in the ring in front of him, Jack considered his options.

Over, under, around, or through?

Jack made his choice, stumbling back a step to create a little room before he used the edge of the mat and the supports of the boxing ring as stepping-stones to flip over the men standing behind him. He landed like a cat; grinned like one too, when he saw the surprise on the faces of the turning men. Then he was running, lunging through the gym’s doors and just caught sight of the pimp as he dove into the back of a black Jaguar XJ.

The car took off in a plume of burning rubber. Raf was too far away, but fate was still in a good mood. Two girls stood at the curb, chatting with a biker. Jack didn’t hesitate. Before he had a chance to switch off the engine or pull down the stand, Jack slipped between the man and his bike, swung a leg over the machine and gave chase. He even begged the biker’s pardon.